Prosecution Exhibit 1: 'madeleine' - What's in the book?

Showing relatives round the incident room ! 

Does that happen in any other investigation , or is it just a McCann thing ? 

Jim Gumboil , love it          

Sure thing someone will correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think showing family and friends around a police 'incident room' is common practice.

What is it in reality - a room? 

This is a door ... this is a desk ... this is a chair ... this is a document cabinet ... this is a computer screen ... this is a shredder ... this is a waste paper bin ... this is a kettle ... this is a dog, blimey where did that come from ... err have I missed anything?

As I ran back into the children’s room the closed curtains flew up in a gust of wind.

My heart lurched as I saw now that, behind them, the window was wide open and the shutters on the outside raised all the way up.

Nausea, terror, disbelief, fear. Icy fear. Dear God, no! Please, no!

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
.....................

What an eccentric performance.  Like a scene from the BBC's black (can I say that word?) comedy 'Inside No.9'.

Ms McCann omits to mention that in the very early hours of the PJ investigation, it was swiftly confirmed there was no evidence of raised shutters, open windows, a break-in, a break-out, nor anything else that might assist Ms McCann's somewhat creative mind.


Nothing here ... move along

BlueBag wrote:

And it wasn't until a whole year later, when finally they were given access to the police files, that Kate discovered that anyone checking the book at reception would have seen a note stating that the McCann party wished to eat in the tapas restaurant every night because they were leaving young children alone in the apartments and needed to be able to check on them easily.

Where is the note referred to above to be found in the PJ files?

Which book in reception?

What did the note say?

Who had access to the book?

There's the rub. After stating it was Rachael who managed to get a table booked (without saying when):

"It wasn’t until a year later, when I was combing through the Portuguese police files, that I discovered that the note requesting our block booking was written in a staff message book, which sat on a desk at the pool reception for most of the day. This book was by definition accessible to all staff and, albeit unintentionally, probably to guests and visitors, too. To my horror, I saw that, no doubt in all innocence and simply to explain why she was bending the rules a bit, the receptionist had added the reason for our request: we wanted to eat close to our apartments as we were leaving our young children alone there and checking on them intermittently."
  madeleine by KATE McCANN

It's a clever - not to say sly - construction of words to suggest a passing predator might have set his course by a note in a book. Here's how the paragraph got spun by a UK tabloid ('Kate McCann fears restaurant reservation booking tipped off Madeleine McCann's abductor'):

"Madeleine McCann may have been snatched after perverts spotted in a tapas reservation book she had been left alone at her holiday flat, mum Kate fears ..."
  https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/kate-mccann-fears-restaurant-reservation-127447

The saintly Kate absolves the receptionist but the article classes the book "left open and in full view of other diners" as a blunder and security lapse. Their aim is to sell newspapers. Kate McCann's is to give an account of the truth for Madeleine, Sean and Amelie, "so that, when they are ready, the facts will be there for them to read". And research.

Kate doesn't particularize her discovery of the block booking in the files but it is central to the witness statement of Luisa Coutinho, receptionist at the Ocean Club. Interviewed days after the disappearance, she remembered that a tall thin man made the booking for the group. During her interview she provided a book with the reservations for the Tapas restaurant, and while it is not said this was entered into the evidence there is no book with reservations discoverable in the PJ files. There are a number of reservation sheets, none with any note explaining the reason for the Tapas group's request.

  http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/TAPAS_BOOKING.htm

So to what does Kate refer?

Reading the paragraph again, it can be interpreted that "the receptionist had added the reason for our request" means not a note to a book but information to her statement. As indeed she did:

The man justified his request by saying that the group had many small children whom they would leave alone when they went to dine. She said that at intervals some two parents would go to the apartments to see if everything was OK.
  http://www.mccannpjfiles.co.uk/PJ/LUISA_COUTINHO.htm

The receptionist is relating what she had been told about the reservation not speaking from knowledge since she worked only until 19:00. There is nothing to say this 'note' had been entered into any book. There is nothing to say how the book with the reservations for the Tapas restaurant was handled or kept. Kate's horror therefore is a matter between her conscience and herself. It calls to the impressionable reader (or newspaper hack) that here is drama where in fact there is no evidence to say that, even if there was a staff message book, anyone other than staff saw it - that word 'probably' - on a desk or anywhere.

To those who believe the tapas reservation was by way of establishing a record of routine, the idea of a staff message book with the inclusion of 'a note' highlighting that a child was available to be abducted goes with an excursion to the beach as parts of a plan.

Not only What is in the book but Why.

As we were walking up from the beach at about 5pm, I had a call from Cherie Blair, in her final days as wife of the prime minister

She was kind and helpful

This was only five days after the abduction

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
...................

If walking on the beach, the call must have been received on a mobile phone.

What was Cherie Blair doing with the mobile phone number of either Kate or Gerry McCann, only five days after Madeleine McCann was reported missing?

Blair, Brown, Cameron, May - I wonder if the McCanns have had direct contact with Boris Johnson somewhere along the way, or are those heady days of fame and fortune now lost in the myths of time.

Alex Woolfall told us that the News of the World, spearheading a group of other benefactors – including Bill Kenwright, the theatre impresario and chairman of Everton FC, businessmen Sir Richard Branson and Sir Philip Green and Harry Potter author J. K. Rowling [CH, OBE, HonFRSE, FRCPE, FRSL - don't ask cos I don't know]  was prepared to put up a reward ‘package’ totalling £1.5 million.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

They are acronyms you get for copying out someone else's ancient stories about a three headed dog, (Cerberus) but then not understanding that the whole point was that one head was always awake, and allowing all three to go to sleep . . 
for copying someone else's stories about flying broomsticks
for copying someone else's stories about walking through solid objects ( the back of a wardrobe, or a wall in a railway station, or into a walled garden) to reach a secret location
for copying someone else's stories about unicorns and werewolves, and metalworking goblins (Nibelungen)
for copying someone else's stories about mermaids and mermen
for copying someone else's stories about giants spiders (Shelob)
for copying someone else's stories about the deadly powers of the Basilisk
for copying someone else's stories about Trolls, dragons, giants, and all the rest

and rolling it all up (Rowling it all up ! ) into a sort of mash, and then marketing it very cleverly as
something to get children to READ – only then to sell the film and video Game rights for multi millions.

Brilliant.
Never underestimate the gullibility of the General Public

appalling intellectual property theft, will never read buy or watch any of them ever.

Thursday 3rd May 2007

I had finished my run by five-thirty at the Tapas area, where I found Madeleine and the twins already having their tea with Gerry.

The others had decided to feed their kids at the beachside restaurant, the Paraíso. Madeleine was sitting on the Tapas terrace, eating.

She looked so pale and worn out, I went straight up to her and asked if she was all right. Had she been OK at the club when Ella left to go to the beach? Yes, she said, but now she was really tired and wanted me to pick her up, which I did. Ten minutes later, the five of us went back to our apartment.

I was carrying Madeleine. Because she was so exhausted we skipped playtime that evening.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[Excerpt for research only]

Talking of blame..

Day eighty came and went, and still no Madeleine.

Eighty days was significant for me because that was how long the Belgian schoolgirl Sabine Dardenne had been kept captive by the evil rapist and murderer Marc Dutroux before being found and freed. I clung on to ‘happy’ endings like these but, needless to say, as the deadlines in my head passed I’d be knocked for six again. That same day, 22 July, the Sunday Express ran the headline: ‘MADDY’S PARENTS TO FACE INQUIRY’. For ‘neglect’, according to the newspaper.

By now we were no strangers to this line of attack, but it was still incredibly hurtful as it blamed us, indirectly, for Madeleine’s abduction. We were not hurt so much by what people might or might not think of us but by the painful reminder that, however unwittingly, we’d given this predator an opportunity. We had not been there for Madeleine. And, as I’ve said before and will say again, our guilt over that is a heavy cross we will bear for the rest of our lives. As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.

Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[For research/study only]

Verdi wrote:Talking of blame..

Day eighty came and went, and still no Madeleine.

Eighty days was significant for me because that was how long the Belgian schoolgirl Sabine Dardenne had been kept captive by the evil rapist and murderer Marc Dutroux before being found and freed. I clung on to ‘happy’ endings like these but, needless to say, as the deadlines in my head passed I’d be knocked for six again. That same day, 22 July, the Sunday Express ran the headline: ‘MADDY’S PARENTS TO FACE INQUIRY’. For ‘neglect’, according to the newspaper.

By now we were no strangers to this line of attack, but it was still incredibly hurtful as it blamed us, indirectly, for Madeleine’s abduction. We were not hurt so much by what people might or might not think of us but by the painful reminder that, however unwittingly, we’d given this predator an opportunity. We had not been there for Madeleine. And, as I’ve said before and will say again, our guilt over that is a heavy cross we will bear for the rest of our lives. As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.

Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

[For research/study only]

Hardly a line of attack when you consider it was their own narrative that they were leaving the children alone at nights and one went missing lol that then is neglect .For anyone else it's neglect followed by charges but no not for this couple, they are above the law it seems. Hopefully that will change.

"As for the abductor, he must have been smiling smugly to himself and thinking, Keep blaming the parents. Just leave me out of it, hidden and anonymous, to carry on doing what I do – stealing children.
Had everyone forgotten about this man? Whoever he was, he was still out there."


And in the past 12 years he has stolen how many children – approximately ?
And in the 10 years before that he stole how many children – again approximately ?

If he believes that that is "doing what I do" I can only observe he is not very good at it.

In the last couple of days, a long standing forum member asked a very simple question, I quote..

Why would you mention something that did not exist?

As always, a simple question demands a simple answer - to deceive.

Anyone who has followed this case over a period of time will be aware of the number of times Gerry and Kate McCann have aimed to deceive, either through their own mouths or by an elected mouthpiece, family, friends and quite frequently Clarence Mitchell.

Kate McCann's autobiographical novel madeleine, is littered with such examples of deception and poetic licence - enough to make even Jane Austen blush from the grave. Some examples, beginning with the most pertinent by way of the books introduction..

~ My reason for writing it is simple: to give an account of the truth

~ It has always been my intention to set down a complete record of what happened to our family, for our children, Madeleine, Sean and Amelie, so that, when they are ready, the facts will be there for them to read.

Enter Hobs !

To continue..

~ I was crying out that I could see Madeleine lying, cold and mottled, on a big grey stone slab.

~ Gerry, meanwhile, was running from pillar to post, urging me to remain in the apartment with the twins so that I’d be on hand if Madeleine was found and brought back there.

~ I was just so overwhelmed by fear, helplessness and frustration, I was hitting out at things, banging my fists on the metal railing of the veranda, trying to expel the intolerable pain inside me.

~ That first weekend I’d felt a burning desire to run up the Rocha Negra, and Gerry and I would in fact do so many times over the next few months.

~ The thought of Madeleine’s fear and pain tears me apart. The thought of paedophiles makes me want to rip my skin off.

~ Haltingly, I told him about the awful pictures that scrolled through my head of her body, her perfect little genitals torn apart.

~ As we ran along the promenade, a small dog jumped out from under a bench and attacked my right calf. It was pretty sore and I was a bit shaken, but I carried on as coolly as I could manage.

~ The only other unexplained detail I remember from that morning was a large, brown stain I noticed on Madeleine’s pink Eeyore pyjama top.
...................

That's a mere drop in the ocean, only a sprinkling by way of example.

We may not know the true reason but everything is said and done for a reason.

I'd lay a bet they're laughing their socks off at us. To that I say .... sometimes the dog turns back and bites you on the bum!

Beware of stray dogs.

I don't know about 'leakage'. Smacks to me of ..

Any evidence they may or may not have found which gave them cause for suspicion of Gerry and Kate can be wholly and easily explained should it come to that.
Clarence Mitchell

Hobs:

Why the Rocha Negra?
What was so special there that she felt the need to run up it?
Why did gerry and her run up it several times in the following months?

Not saying you're wrong necessarily, but the Rocha Negra run is the one to take if you want a short challenging workout, as opposed to the relatively level and untaxing 'jog' she went on with Matt.

The first bit is fairly level but once you get past the Freud villa you wouldn't have enough breath to chat any more.


Probably the first time I have almost come down on the Mc's side, but if I wanted to get away and take my mind off something for a while, that is what I would have done.


Whether I would have been in the right mindset to actually leave the kids and go for a run is a different matter altogether!  

A lady from an apartment across Rua Dr Gentil Martins, overlooking our little side gate, came over to speak to us. She said that the previous night she had seen a car going up the Rocha Negra – the black, volcanic cliff that dominates the village. There was a track leading to the Rocha Negra but nobody remembered ever having noticed any vehicle that far up in the daytime, let alone at night. This immediately conjured visions of Madeleine being disposed of somewhere on the overhanging cliff. I went to tell one of the police officers who was able to speak a little English. He was quite dismissive. It would have been one of the GNR men checking the area, he said.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

I also felt a compulsion to run up to the top of the Rocha Negra. Somehow, inflicting physical pain on myself seemed to be the only possible way of escaping my internal pain. The other truly awful manifestation of what I was feeling was a macabre slideshow of vivid pictures in my brain that taunted me relentlessly. I was crying out that I could see Madeleine lying, cold and mottled, on a big grey stone slab. Looking back, seeing me like this must have been terrible for my friends and relatives, and particularly my parents, but I couldn’t help myself. And all this needed to come out. I dread to think what it might have done to me if it hadn’t.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
.................
I seriously doubt either Gerry or Kate McCann would purposely lead the police to a place connected in any way to the disappearance of their daughter - more likely they would divert attention.

River deep - mountain high?

That aside, the book surpasses any best seller the likes of Barbara Cartland could create for melodrama.  I can see why folk thought JK Rowling might be the ghostwriter, or even why Kate McCann sowed the seed for folk to think.  Kate McCann's autobiographical novel could compare any day to a JK Rowling fantasy.

That first weekend I’d felt a burning desire to run up the Rocha Negra, and Gerry and I would in fact do so many times over the next few months. In places it was just too steep and I had to slow down to walking speed, but if I dared to stop (interpreted by my brain as failure) I would mentally beat myself up.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

Picture Credits

I feel a strong bond with Praia da Luz – the place I last saw Madeleine. The church of Nossa Senhora da Luz.
[Try loving memories opposed to self love]

The Rocha Negra, pictured early one morning on my mobile phone from ‘my rocks’ on the beach.
[Rock on!]

The lovely children of Rabat, Morocco, touched our hearts.
[Child abuse]

Praying at the shrine at Fátima.
[Fake faith]

Meeting the Pope: a very important day – for us and especially for Madeleine. Wherever she is, I know that God is with her.
[You didn't 'meet' his Paypalness and the PR exercise in no way benefited Madeleine.]

The NCMEC age-progressed image of ‘Madeleine, aged six’. The artist used childhood pictures of Gerry and myself, as well as photographs of Madeleine, in creating this portrait.
[Which photograph of Madeleine was used - the last photograph or the one in the pram]

Me at around the same age.
[That's useful]

Several witnesses reported seeing men behaving suspiciously around the Ocean Club in the days leading up to Madeleine’s abduction (full details are given in the Key Sightings section). The witnesses helped to produce images of these men, who have yet to be identified.
[Funny that innit?]

Artist’s impressions of the man and child seen by Jane Tanner on the evening of 3 May 2007, around the time Madeleine was taken. This man was crossing the junction of Rua Dr Agostinho da Silva and Rua Dr Francisco Gentil Martins, which runs alongside apartment 5A. He has never been traced. Did you see him? Was it you, or someone you know?
[That was Julian Totman - or someone similar]

Flipping heck Verdi, I thought you'd cracked the case. I feel a strong bond with Praia da Luz- the place I last saw Madeleine.The church of Nossa Senhora  da Luz.I didn't see the full stop at first glance.

Verdi wrote:I also felt a compulsion to run up to the top of the Rocha Negra. Somehow, inflicting physical pain on myself seemed to be the only possible way of escaping my internal pain. The other truly awful manifestation of what I was feeling was a macabre slideshow of vivid pictures in my brain that taunted me relentlessly. I was crying out that I could see Madeleine lying, cold and mottled, on a big grey stone slab. Looking back, seeing me like this must have been terrible for my friends and relatives, and particularly my parents, but I couldn’t help myself. And all this needed to come out. I dread to think what it might have done to me if it hadn’t.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN
.................
I seriously doubt either Gerry or Kate McCann would purposely lead the police to a place connected in any way to the disappearance of their daughter - more likely they would divert attention.

River deep - mountain high?

That aside, the book surpasses any best seller the likes of Barbara Cartland could create for melodrama.  I can see why folk thought JK Rowling might be the ghostwriter, or even why Kate McCann sowed the seed for folk to think.  Kate McCann's autobiographical novel could compare any day to a JK Rowling fantasy.

I , Me , Myself and I .

She couldn't martyr herself more could she !

A FAMILY OF FIVE

~ Madeleine suffered from colic.
~ She cried for the best part of each day for the first four months of her life.
~ When she had one of her screaming episodes her little fists would clench tightly and her face would turn purple with discomfort.
~ Unfortunately for Madeleine, it could strike at any time, not just in the early evening, as is typically the case
~ Needless to say, those early days could be very long and she was constantly in my arms.
~ It’s hard to remember how I managed when I look back and picture myself buttering a piece of toast with one hand holding Madeleine in the other arm and never being able to answer the phone or even go to the toilet unaccompanied.
~ Madeleine and I spent endless days dancing around our living room to the sounds of MTV
~ Poor Gerry would arrive home from work and would hardly have a foot over the threshold before he was handed a roaring bundle while I went upstairs for a loo break, a scream-free moment and a chance to regain the use of my arms.
~ There were several occasions when the three of us would be huddled together in the kitchen, crying – Madeleine with her colic and Gerry and I at the futility of our attempts to take away her pain.

madeleine by KATE MCCANN

More melodrama from the woman herself .

Harvey's gripe water, don't forget the calpol. I wonder what she advised her patients when they went in with colicky babies.
huddle up together and have a good scrike.

You ain't seen nothing yet! I redacted the above ^^^ for obvious reasons.

This one's a corker..

Gerry and I spent hours running through our checklist – Is she too cold? Is she too hot? Is she hungry? Does she need her nappy changing? – before we were able to accept that this was colic, and this was what happened with colic.

The words of a trained medic - a general practitioner, speaking also of her husband, a trained medic.

That is the reason I stay away from doctors. By the time they find out what's wrong with you, you are addicted to drugs. I cant believe she actually put their inadequacy in print.

Friday 4th May 2007

After an hour or so, Gerry, Matt and Jane were taken off for questioning. I remember constantly looking at the clock, counting the hours since we’d last seen Madeleine, my terror mounting with every five minutes that passed. My body, as well as my mind, appeared to have locked down. Bill and Angela went out for food and water for us but I had no interest in eating.

Gerry told us afterwards that when he’d asked about deploying helicopters and heat-detecting equipment in the search, the police officer interviewing him had replied, ‘This is not the UK.’ There were no helicopters and no infra-red cameras, he was told. Gerry was also insisting that they speak to Jes Wilkins, in case he had seen the man and child reported by Jane. In fact, we found out later, an officer with a translator – Robert Murat, the man who had interpreted for me that morning – visited Jes and his partner, Bridget O’Donnell, in their apartment some time the same afternoon.

Kate McCann's autobiographical novel goes into great detail about the group's encounter with Robert Murat in the first 48 hours after Madeleine McCann's disappearance was reported, I won't reproduce it here for that reason alone.

In short, there was a concerted effort to implicate Robert Murat in Madeleine's disappearance, not so much the McCanns themselves, they never commit when there is willing spokesperson on call, but from their 'friends', in particular the infamous quartet - Jane Tanner, Russell O'Brien, David Payne and Fiona Payne.

If guilt is overpowering I quite understand the need to find a quick fix but in this instance - why Robert Murat?

Ocean Club staff, guests and lurking strangers were all milling about nillywilly - why not one of them?  Why create a lie to implicate a stranger, the one who had been assisting with interview interpretations, a prominent figure during those first few days?

There is little doubt in my mind that Robert Murat's interference in those early hours/days was by design rather than chance but the reason is unclear.  On the surface it could easily be concluded that he was a covert employee of the abduction scam - a facilitator to gain confidential information on behalf of the alleged victims - the McCanns.  That's how it appears to me but how exactly does that fit in with the deliberate attempt by team McCann to implicate Robert Murat in those early hours/days - only to backtrack and distance themselves soon after?  

Why, a diversion of course!

For the record, I don't believe Robert Murat was working for MI5 or any other branch of the UK establishment.  The diplomatic corps were swiftly deployed to control the investigation, flying in the face of international diplomatic protocol - do they normally work closely with MI5 in the case of a missing child on holiday with the family?  Not to my knowledge!

Still, I digress....

I can only summise that they (Gerry Kate Russell etc)thought this through and for Robert Murat help would purposely finger him for the abduction knowing full well that this would inevitably end up in the papers for which he could sue for a substantial sum as his compensation for helping them-easy money.

ferrotty wrote:I can only summise that they (Gerry Kate Russell etc)thought this through and for Robert Murat help would purposely finger him for the abduction knowing full well that this would inevitably end up in the papers for which he could sue for a substantial sum as his compensation for helping them-easy money.

...a little byzantine perhaps, but look at the number of "Roll-Backs" (where someone is falsely accused, pilloried by the press, then exonerated and paid out massive lump sums from the press / damages courts) that have been ushered in since?  Pop Singers, Murder Suspects, how many times has this happened?  Then you add in the phone hacking scandal...not as far fetched as it might seem.